The 192-member UN General Assembly on Dec. 18 voted its "deep
concern" over atrocities in Iran, such as stoning, repression of
female dissidents and persecution of human rights defenders. The
government's campaign against its people has targeted Internet
cafes and young women who show too much hair. Executions - many in
public - were up at least 19% over 2006. At universities, dozens of
students and teachers who are too liberal or speak out against the
regime have been arrested or silenced - especially after President
Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad was in 2006 heckled during a speech at the
prestigious Amir-Kabir University of Technology. The leadership's
paranoia over what Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Commander
Mohammad Ali Ja'fari calls "internal threats" now extends
to its own ranks.

Former nuclear negotiator Hossein Mousavian was arrested recently
on espionage charges, which drew sharp response from Supreme Leader
Ayatollah Khamenei. Iran's 70m people - two-thirds younger than 33
- are alienated from their government and tired of nearly three decades
of "Islamic revolution" with little to show for it. They
resent the wasteful spending of billions of dollars in oil income.
Public frustrations could explode in the lead-up to March 2008 elections
for parliament or the 2009 presidential vote.

Riots erupted last June when subsidised gasoline prices were
raised. As rigged as elections are by the ruling clerics, they do spark
struggles between conservatives and reformers which reflect the public
mood. The mood now is focused on an inflation rate of 20% - matched by a
similar rate in unemployment. When he was elected in 2005, Ahmadi-Nejad
promised to put "the oil money on people's dinner
tables". People are eating inflated prices for food and other
basics, barely coping in an economy rising too slowly for Iran's
population growth. All this led 21 opposition parties to form a
coalition recently in the name of saving Iran from crisis. The coalition
is led by former Presidents Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mohammad
Khatami, the latter inspiring the opposition to be bolder in its claims
that it represents the interests of Iran's poor, not the current
leadership. Ahmadi-Nejad claims the US is behind the discontent.
Economic mismanagement and political repression are the real foes.
Current UN economic sanctions on Iran for its nuclear ambitions add a
measure of pressure on the theocracy. In January the UNSC may impose
stiffer sanctions.

US Hits At Chinese Tehran Oil Deal: The US has complained to
Beijing about the $2 bn Dec. 9 buy-back contract between the state-owned
Sinopec and National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC) to develop the giant
Yadavaran oilfield in Iran. The FT on Dec. 21 quoted a "senior US
official" as saying: "We were very concerned to see the
announcement and we have followed up and communicated that concern to
the Chinese government...at multiple levels". He said the US was
waiting for "further details" from China about the
transaction, adding: "We don't think it makes sense for any
country to be expanding its investment in the energy field in
Iran".

Investments in Iran's energy sector are likely to escape UNSC
sanctions in the near future, but they are key to Iran's economy -
and are therefore the subject of concerted US lobbying. But other powers
- including Britain and France, which both support further action - say
the sanctions drive has been complicated by the Dec. 3 publication of
the NIE. The official said: "We hope in...January to have a
resolution passed by the full Security Council. The Iranians have been
saying for the last two weeks [since publication of the NIE] that there
is no longer a reason for the UN even to be involved in the issue...I
think it will be a rude awakening to them that the permanent five [UNSC]
members think otherwise".

Washington is frustrated by the deadlock at the UN. But although
both Russia and China have reservations about sanctions, the US says it
has received more co-operation from Moscow than from Beijing - despite
Russia's announcement it had recently delivered a fuel shipment for
Iran's nuclear reactor at Bushehr. The US had welcomed signs that
Russia was not completing work on Bushehr before late 2008 as helpful
additional leverage on Iran. The US official said: "For a very long
time we thought it was good for Russia to delay the [Bushehr] project...
This...makes our argument. Iran does not need its own capacity to
produce fissile material...when it has a country like Russia willing to
ship fuel in".

Iran on Dec. 17 indicated it was building a second nuclear power
plant. The revelation came in comments by the head of Iran's Atomic
Energy Organisation, Gholam-Reza Aghazadeh, made to state-run TV. He was
dismissing speculation that the arrival of the Russian fuel would allow
Iran to halt its uranium enrichment in Natanz. He said: "We are
building a 360 MW indigenous power plant in Darkhovein", referring
to a southern city north of Bushehr. He added: "The fuel for this
plant needs to be produced by the Natanz enrichment facility".
Bushehr and Darkhovein were both planned before 1979. It was not clear
how much construction had been done at Darkhovein. The location is
sometimes spelled Darkhovin, or referred to by other nearby place names,
including Ahvaz, Esteghlal and Karun.

Aghazadeh said Iran needed to increase the centrifuges at Natanz
from 3,000 to 50,000, adding that with the current 3,000 it could only
produce fuel for a 100 MW plant. Moscow has indicated the 1,000 MW
Bushehr plant could come on line within three months at up to 200 MW
before being cranked up to full capacity nine months later.

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) told the Wall
Street Journal of Dec. 11 that Tehran did shut down its nuclear weapons
programme in late 2003 but restarted it a year later, dispersing
equipment to thwart international inspectors (see
news25-Iran-USDec17-07).

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